Alberta Premier Danielle Smith says the fall update to the province’s bill of rights will protect Albertans’ personal medical decisions, including the right to refuse a vaccine.
Smith’s pledge came during a town hall in Bonnyville with over 300 UCP members, where she discussed strengthening residents’ liberties and freedoms, lowering taxes, protecting the province from federal overreach, and improving healthcare.
Smith confirmed the plans in a statement to True North.
“In the fall, we will be introducing legislation to amend Alberta’s bill of rights. Several amendments are being considered to strengthen Albertans’ individual and property rights, including an amendment to guarantee Albertans the right to accept or refuse a medical treatment,” she said.
Before becoming premier in 2022, Smith pledged to amend the Alberta Human Rights Act to prohibit employers from terminating employees based on their vaccination status, but she ultimately scrapped these plans after she was elected.
At the time, she called Albertans losing their jobs for declining to take the vaccine a “human rights violation.”
However, the Public Health Act takes precedence over all laws except the Alberta Bill of Rights, meaning an amended Alberta Human Rights Act would have done little to protect medical choices in the face of public health edicts.
Smith also promised to ban post-secondary institutions from imposing vaccine mandates on students.
“This decision damaged the education and mental health of thousands of Alberta’s best and brightest,” said Smith.
One of Smith’s first actions after being elected was to fire all 11 members of the Alberta Health Services’ board of directors just days after firing Chief Medical Officer Dr. Deena Hinshaw.
Under Hinshaw’s leadership, Alberta Health Services advised former premier Jason Kenney to implement vaccine mandates and to close schools and churches. AHS officers visited churches to ensure compliance with protocols, fining or shutting down those that did not comply.
During Smith’s first press conference as premier, just hours after being sworn in, she said that the unvaccinated had experienced the most discrimination of any group in her lifetime.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau previously had harsh words for Canadians who opposed vaccination.
“There are also people who are fiercely opposed to vaccination, who don’t believe in science, who are often misogynistic, often racist too. It’s a small group, but it takes up space,” said Trudeau. “Do we tolerate these people?”